Belarusians actively buying real estate in Cyprus

However, the Cyprian authorities will now check if their clients are on the list of Belarusians forbidden to enter the European Union. 

Belarusians have started buying real estate in Cyprus recently. The director of a local real estate company “ClickHomeCyprus”Stavros Papadouris has informed about it at a press conference with Belarusian, Ukrainian, Russian and Moldavian journalists in a resort city Limassol: 

“70% of our clients used to be British and now we have 70-80% of clients from the former Soviet Union. At first they were mostly Russians. They came to Cyprus and made purchases without asking any questions. More and more Belarusian clients have started arriving here lately. There is a new wave that emerged two years ago – clients from Belarus”.

Speaking about the type of Belarusian clients and the money they possessed, the director of the company divided them into two categories.

Stavros Papadouris: “The first category includes businessmen, business-oriented people buying property costing from 200 to 350 thousand euro. There is another category. They are successful businessmen who started their business back in the 90s. Some of them are Cyprian residents. The prices differ from 700 thousand to 1-1.5 million euro in this case”.

According to Stavros Papadouris, there is a lot of real estate for sale in Cyprus. Even the world crisis has not affected the demand much. He says that quite famous guests can be noticed among clients sometimes.

Stavros Papadouris: “Half of famous politicians, businessmen and so on, mostly from Russia, own real estate in Cyprus. However, their real estate is usually registered by companies situated in different countries”.

The Euroradio reporter wondered if there were famous Belarusian politicians or high-ranking officials among real estate owners in Cyprus. But Stavros Papadouris did not manage to answer the question. Unlike Russian politicians and officials who are sometimes shown in international news, he does not know how Belarusians representatives of this elite look like.

At first sight, it is fairly simple to buy real estate in Cyprus – you just need money. Then you should hire a lawyer who will represent your interests and chose a flat or a villa you can afford with the help of a real estate company. Stavros Papadouris’ company can offer about 5 thousand variants. 

However, it only seems easy. In fact, the money you possess will be checked by the Cyprian Central Bank at first. If there are any doubts in their “cleanness”, they will not sell you a seaside villa. According to Stavros, it has already happened before. Furthermore, the candidature of a new owner of Cyprian real estate should be approved by the country’s government. 

Stavros Papadouris: “Besides the Central Bank’s approval; the future owner of real estate in Cyprus should receive the Council of Ministers’ agreement. What does it mean? I want to buy something and my lawyer sends an application to the government. The government agrees if the client is not wanted by the Interpol or some other European services”. 

The Euroradio’s reporter wondered if people could buy real estate in Cyprus if the European Union had imposed visa sanctions on them or if they were on the list of personae non gratae in the Schengen Area. According to Stavros Papadouris, despite the fact that the person may be accused of political issues and no crimes, the Cyprian Council of Ministers is unlikely to allow such a person to buy real estate in the country.

Foto Zmicier Lukashuk and exclusivet.ru